DC 37 DEAL DEBATE BEGINS

DC 37 Deal Debate Begins

Even before District Council 37's tentative wage contract was formally announced July 17, debate had begun on what impact it would have on other unions' bargaining.

United Federation of Teachers President Randi Weingarten, a co-chair of the 20-union bargaining coalition formed last month, insisted that just as the city had tailored the deal to meet DC 37's needs, it would have to craft an agreement suited to the different needs and priorities of coalition members. Mayor Bloomberg, on the other hand, contended that the DC 37 deal "continues the basic parameters for this round of bargaining and sets new parameters for future rounds of contracts."

The first part of his statement was a reference to the DC 37 deal beginning with a 3.15-percent raise. That is the same basic amount given to unions representing Teachers and several groups of uniformed employees at the end of their most recent contracts, which had extended for a year or more beyond the duration of the last DC 37 pact.

"Once we set a pattern, we stick with the pattern," the Mayor told reporters in the City Hall Blue Room. He added that the city's bargaining history with its unions showed that "People tend to move in lockstep, and I don't see any reason that that wouldn't continue."

Ms. Weingarten is among the prominent municipal union leaders who in recent years have raised their voices in protest against what she calls "lockstep pattern bargaining." And so the debate will undoubtedly continue about whether the first contract of a bargaining round should set a pattern for all other unions.

This time around, matters are more complicated than usual because of the disparities in the lengths of the contracts for unions during the previous round. Police unions that have settled contracts in the last 13 months have had their durations vary from two years (for Police Officers and Sergeants) to 50-1/2 months (Lieutenants). The union representing Correction Officers reached two separate contracts totaling 53 months in length, while Correction Captains got a single deal spanning 54 months and the union for those in the rank of Assistant Deputy Warden and above got a deal lasting two months longer than that.

The UFT is working under a contract for 52 months, 12 days. Each of the variations on deals that typically are measured in whole years is the result of a union leader extending a contract to squeeze out extra benefits, with the Bloomberg administration calculating the value to the day.

One area of the debate will be on whether the pattern set by DC 37 with its April 2004 contract held up. Several key uniformed union leaders insist that it was shattered by the June 2005 arbitration award for the Patrolmen's Benevolent Association. They point to the fact that even when the givebacks that award included at the expense of future officers are considered, raises to officers in the PBA boosted the city's payroll costs by 6 percent, while the first two years of the three-year DC 37 pact meant only a 3-percent rise in the city's salary costs. Workers from other unions have reason to view this DC 37 deal with greater optimism than they did the last one. It obviously is better financially than the last deal, which over three years provided just 4 percent in raises that were not offset by givebacks. This pact is four months shorter yet would provide better than 5 percent more (the compounded value of the raises is 9.42 percent) in wage increases, improve other benefits and has no givebacks at all.

Asked why he had moved off his longtime position that unions had to offer productivity savings in any contract, the Mayor stated, "It gets more difficult to deliver services and do so with cost savings." A loose translation of that statement is that he has come to understand, from examples like the difficulty the city has encountered in recruiting Police Officers after the PBA award sharply reduced the pay scale for new officers, that there is a point at which "productivity savings" become counterproductive.

Mr. Bloomberg has long acknowledged that the city needs to fairly compensate its workers if it wants to attract and retain people who will deliver quality services. The DC 37 deal is an implicit statement to groups like the Citizens Budget Commission that his administration has reached the point where squeezing more givebacks from the unions could adversely affect service quality.

Perhaps the most intriguing question about the DC 37 deal is how it will influence the PBA, which has seemed almost divorced from the rest of the municipal bargaining action because it is two years behind most other uniformed unions.

Recruiting problems have forced the NYPD to scale down the most recent Police Academy class, with 231 fewer officers entering than had been planned. The pressure City Hall has felt as a result helps to explain why Labor Relations Commissioner Jim Hanley last month made a more-attractive offer to the PBA even before the union had reacted to his previous offer.

The city has since filed for a declaration of impasse that would lead to arbitration with the PBA. The question now is whether the DC 37 deal, which will fully implement all 9.42 percent of the raises for that union's members by next Feb. 1, will prompt rank-and-file cops to pressure their union to get serious about bargaining rather than attempting the improbable feat of persuading arbitrators to give the PBA a better deal than the existing one for the Uniformed Firefighters' Association.